


Too Late

by scifigeek14



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Drabble, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Grief/Mourning, One Shot, Post-Series, The death warning is just for those who canonically died in the show finale, this takes place a few weeks after the season finale
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-08
Updated: 2015-05-08
Packaged: 2018-03-29 13:57:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,701
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3898882
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scifigeek14/pseuds/scifigeek14
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's a case of Too Little, Too Late when it comes to Spike. Buffy is hurting, anyone can see it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Too Late

**Author's Note:**

> I just finished the show and the last season was so beautiful for the Spike/Buffy relationship. I was inspired to write a short piece on the aftermath. Enjoy.

They ended up in England for a while before moving on. During that time they licked their wounds, all jammed into Giles’s tiny apartment. The girls mourned those they’d lost in the fight. Xander locked himself in his room for two days until Willow was able to get him to come out for food and cheer him up a bit. He was still hurting over Anya, but by day three he was smiling again. Robin healed slowly under Faith’s care. Giles got to work on rebuilding the Watchers’ legacy and find the newest slayers that had been awakened. Willow and Kennedy did the cooking for the most part. Dawn and Andrew were just trying to keep everyone from falling apart, helping where they could.

Buffy was attempting to do everything. She helped Giles when she could. She helped make breakfast. She helped Andrew with supply runs and listened as he complained about having to actually buy the items. She laughed when everyone laughed and smiled when everyone smiled, perhaps even more so. What she didn’t do, was mourn. That is why the Scoobies found themselves having a meeting without Buffy to talk about what to do.

“She can’t keep going on like this,” Willow spoke softly, while Buffy cleaned the dishes in the kitchen, “It’s not healthy.”

“I know,” Xander responded, “It’s like she is in denial that he’s gone. That he even existed.”

“Yeah,” Dawn piped up, “One time I tried to bring him up – just all casual like, you know? I said something about how he used to like his eggs runny even though he didn’t even need to eat, right? And she just ignored it completely, like she didn’t even hear me. Just asked how well-done I wanted my bacon. It was like trying to talk to BuffyBot.”

“Come again?” Robin asked confused, looking at Faith for guidance but she just shrugged.

“Uh, long story, and not the point,” Xander said deciding it was easier to just not explain that particular debacle, “We have to do something about this.”

“What though?” Andrew spoke up, having still not learned that no one really wanted his opinion, “You can’t force someone to mourn. Isn’t that something that’s supposed to just, you know, happen?”

“I could try punching her. That might spark some waterworks,” Faith offered. She received glares, “I was just kidding… mostly.”

“A comment about eggs isn’t going to do it, I’m afraid,” Giles spoke quietly, pulling his glasses from his face to rub at the bridge of his nose, “We have to let her know that it’s alright for her to mourn him.”

“What do you mean? Well, of course it’s _alright_. She knows that. She knows that, right?” Willow asked nervously.

“I don’t know that she does. Spike was never really one of us. We never really trusted him or were completely comfortable with him, even after he got his soul. I tried to have him killed just a month or so ago.”

“You what?” Dawn asked, shocked and horrified. She had been slowly forgiving Spike for trying to hurt her sister and his sacrifice had clinched it for her. She’d cried the night after he’d died, wishing she had forgiven him sooner.

“I regret it very deeply. I didn’t believe that he had truly changed. Soul or no, I didn’t trust him not to hurt us or another human with his chip out. And what is more, I made Buffy feel worse for trusting him herself.”

“So, you think,” Xander said, starting to understand, “Because she thinks we can’t stand him, that we will think less of her for mourning his death?”

“That is my belief, yes. Well partially, I’m sure it is traditional denial in some part as well.” There was a pause, and they all stared at each other in heavy silence.

“Anyone else feel like crap?” Xander asked. All of them, even Faith and Robin, raised their hands. Well, except Andrew. They turned to look at him expectantly.

“What?” He asked defensively, “I liked Spike. Us formally evil guys have to stick together.” Xander smacked the back of his head.

“We have to make this right, you guys,” Willow stated, while Andrew rubbed the back of his head, “I can feel her hurting. I just want to shake her and then hug her and never let go. Xander, I don’t suppose you have any more yellow crayon speeches stored up?”

“I think that perhaps, I should be the one to say something,” Giles sighed, “I was the worst of all of us.”

“Will and I got your back,” Xander confirmed as the three of them stood. He looked directly at Andrew, and said, “You guys stay here, best for the original Team Buffy to handle this one.”

They walked into the kitchen solemnly. Buffy was humming the melody of the newest Avril Lavigne single while she did the dishes, the sad one. Xander and Willow hung back and Giles approached her.

“Buffy?” He called softly to her, standing next to her at the sink.

“Yes, Giles?” She responded with a smile, “Did you need something?” She sounded so happy. So fake. It nearly broke his heart. He had never seen her act this way. When her mother had died, when she’d had to kill Angel, she had cried and it had helped. He had to fix this.

“I wanted to say that I was wrong.” Buffy refused to look up from where she was drying a wine glass.

“About what?” Her voice was carefully casual, controlled.

“Spike.”

The stem of the wine glass snapped off in her hand and she dropped the broken glass into the full sink with a splash. Her shoulders hunched up defensively and she gripped the countertop with shaking hands.

“Don’t,” She whispered roughly, “Don’t.” But Giles pushed on.

“It feels like a blight to his memory for me to not acknowledge that I should have believed you when you said that he was trustworthy. William was – ”

“Shut up! You don’t get to use his name like that!” Buffy snapped, loudly, interrupting him mid-sentence, “Like you were friends, like you knew him at all! You didn’t know him! None of you did,” She shouted, smacking her hand on the counter in anger, “You thought he was a monster till the day he died. Even after he got his soul back, after he fought besides us, after he protected Dawn. He was still just a _thing_ to you. Well, he wasn’t to me! Because _I_ saw him. I saw him losing his mind with the First in his head and a soul in his chest. I saw him crying in a church in his weakest moments and laughing in the middle of a fight because he loved the rush of it. I saw the way he cared when he pretended he didn’t, the way he hurt when he pretended he was fine. I saw the way he hated himself and the way that he loved me.

“He really loved me, you know? I thought, for the longest time, that it was a selfish love, and maybe at first it was. But he saw me, too. He knew exactly what to say when I needed him to say it. He made me feel safe when the world was falling apart around me,” Silent tears began to slip from her lashes and her voice dropped to a whisper, “He told me that he knew exactly who I was. I knew who he was, too. He was a _hero_.”

“We know he was, Buff,” Xander assured her, coming forward to rest his hand on her arm, “We know.”

She turn towards him and grabbed his arm at the wrist. He came with her when she slid down the front of the counter to the floor. Willow rushed forward to join them on the ground. Buffy’s eyelids scrunched together and she choked out a sob.

“He’s gone, Willow.”

“I know, Buffy,” She whispered, with a slight warble in her voice, “I’m so sorry.”

“It hurts to breathe.”

“I know. I know.” And she did. Xander understood too. They wrapped their arms around her.

“I spent so long keeping him at arm’s length. Even after he got his soul, I was still so scared to let him in. I kept saying that I just wanted to be friends, that I didn’t want him to love me. By the time I figured out I wanted his love, it was too late, Wills. He’s gone and he doesn’t even know and he’ll never know.”

“He knew, sweetie. I’m sure he knew.”

“Yes, Buffy,” Giles confirmed, crouching beside the group, “You always stood up for him and he knew that you believed he had changed, that you saw the good in him. He knew you cared for him. I am positive that he knew you cared.”

“Aaargh!” She shouted, frustrated and upset, putting her face in her hands and shaking her head, heaving death breaths, “I didn’t just care about him, Giles! I loved him! I loved him. And I thought that we’d get to try, to do things right. Dating and taking it slow and not sneaking around ashamed. And you’d see that he’s changed. And he’d see that we could be together now. And that maybe we would be happy. But instead I had to say it as a good-bye. And he didn’t even believe me!” She let out a snot-filled snort, “He said, ‘No you don’t. But thanks for saying it.’ And then he – he just smiled at me and – and –”

She devolved into sobbing. They held her while she cried. Xander tucked her head under his chin and Willow rubbed her arm while Giles held her hand in his larger ones. After a bit Dawn came in from where she’d been listening in the other room and joined the pile. Whatever Spike had or hadn’t believed, Buffy had made him happy, she’d made him want to be good, made him a man instead of a monster. She’d made him into a hero. And Giles vowed right there and then that he would make sure the future generations knew just who had saved the world.


End file.
